


Binary Stars

by sinestrated



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Din is soft, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Starvation, but also stupid, emaciation, exes getting back together, ritual scarring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-09-22
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:54:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25943920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinestrated/pseuds/sinestrated
Summary: Six months after Nevarro, Din disappears on a bounty. Paz goes after him, forcing them both to confront their sordid history.
Relationships: The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)/Paz Vizla
Comments: 67
Kudos: 418





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Well, I am a liar who lies. :) Didn't think I'd ever end up finishing this WIP, but there you go. I don't much like the writing here--I suck at present tense--but maybe you'll enjoy it regardless.
> 
> 20k words total. Updates every Tuesday.

He’s in the middle of an infiltration when the message comes in, which is...inconvenient, to say the least.

In retrospect, Paz really should’ve silenced his vambrace. But it’s not like these days he gets comms frequently, or at all, so he just didn’t think about it. When the sudden three-high three-low beeping sounds out in the silence of the bunker, he’s almost as startled as his targets.

As it stands, he slaps his palm down on his vambrace immediately, but the damage is done. The gang of tall, furry Breskilians immediately starts hooting in alarm, quills unsheathing in the darkness of the bunker as they fall into defensive formation. Paz sighs, steps into the light, and draws his vibroblade.

So much for not messy.

Fifteen minutes later, covered in blood and smelling of blaster smoke, with two quills sticking painfully out of his shoulder and a fresh six-inch gouge across his chestplate, he sinks back against the wall of the bunker outside, panting, and brings up the transmission. If it’s the client again, demanding another update or threatening to lower payment once more, he’s calling it quits on this fucking planet. Issik knows there are plenty of other shitty little worlds out there where a Mandalorian can scrape a living.

He brings up the transmission information and...huh. Definitely not the client. The message originates from Tatooine, a place Paz hasn’t been in a couple decades, at least. Who the hell would want to reach out to him from there?

The message itself doesn’t help, little cone of pale blue light resolving a few inches above his vambrace to settle into a face he’s never seen before. It’s a human woman, maybe a few years his senior judging from the wrinkles and the wildness of her curly hair. She’s got the look of a mechanic, sharp calculating eyes and a smudge of engine oil across her cheek, and she squints up at him with her jaw all set in a hard line, as if he’s somehow managed to offend her merely by existing.

“So,” she says, as Paz blinks. “Name’s Peli. Peli Motto. I dunno who you are but uh, I think your friend’s in trouble. Mando. You know ‘im? ‘Bout yay high, wearin’ full beskar, got that long burgundy cape, hates droids for no reason? Anyway, he dropped his kid with me a few days ago and went off on a job, but he hasn’t come back. Was due two days ago. He told me to go down this list of like, emergency contacts or whatever, but I ain’t heard back from this Cara person or this Mr. Karga, and you’re next on the list. So, you know. Maybe come by, at least pick up the kid and pay off his repair costs, I got a business to run here! I own Hangar 36 on the east side of...ah, never mind, I’ll just send coordinates.”

And the message flickers off.

In the sudden, glaring silence, Paz breathes. Fuck. Only one Mandalorian fits her description.  _ Din. _

It’s been, what, six months since that skirmish with the Guild on Nevarro? Shit, he hasn’t allowed himself to think about Din since then, just assumed he’s been managing fine, or at least as fine as can be when it comes to Din Djarin. If he thinks about it more deeply than that...

_ I think your friend’s in trouble. _

Goddamnit. Paz tips his head up at the dusty sky above, clogged with dirt and smog and the silhouettes of busy ships. Fucking Din. Of course he’d manage to get himself into one scrape or another, stubborn and hardheaded as he is. And of course he’d find a way to loop Paz into it. Paz Vizsla, the sucker for soft eyes and a pretty smile.

_ Don’t go. _ It’s his first instinct, and a good one. Din obviously has other people now, friends like Peli and those other folks in the message. They can take care of him. And what good would it do either of them for Paz to show up now? Din’s not his responsibility anymore; the younger man made that abundantly clear ten years ago. 

_ Don’t you fucking dare. You’ll just end up hurt again. _

But then why does Din even have him listed for emergencies? They’re not...there hasn’t been anything between them for almost a decade. And Peli said she’d tried Din’s other contacts with no success. Does that mean the younger Mandalorian is out there somewhere right now, alone and probably injured, with no one coming to back him up?

_ Don’t you do it, Vizsla. Don’t... _

Fuck.

Yanking the quills out of his shoulder with a hiss, he turns and stalks toward the nearest hangar, cursing himself all the while.

#

The woman’s got hair like an angry  _ zatu _ puff-bug, and she screeches and grabs the nearest repair droid when he walks up behind her and grunts, “You Peli?”

The poor droid immediately falls into its compact form, its two compatriots squeaking and doing the same. Peli Motto herself looks like she’s trying to decide between murdering him and finishing her heart attack. “Of all the holy—don’t  _ do _ that!” Then she blinks, eyebrows lifting. “Wait. You’re another Mando.”

“Yeah.” He can tell she wants to ask questions and cuts her off quickly. “So what was the job?”

To her credit she doesn’t try to push, just sets the droid down and nods at her empty hangar. “I didn’t ask,” she says. “He brought his ship in maybe two weeks ago? Hung around the cantinas looking for jobs, and a few days later...oh.”

Something brushes Paz’s boot and he nearly jumps out of his skin, scrambling back a step and grabbing for his blaster—

The hell?

It’s a kid. Has to be, with those big eyes and floppy green ears. A baby? He’s never seen its species before, doesn’t know how old it is, but it’s definitely young. And looking up at him with odd attachment, reaching its little three-fingered hands up, almost like it wants...

Peli chuckles then, soft. “It thinks you’re him,” she says. “Mando, I mean.”

Oh. Shit.

It’s  _ the _ child. It has to be. The one Din fetched for that job so long ago, the one with the Imperial client, the pile of beskar ingots stamped with the Empire’s sigil that Paz used to vent a decade of rage and frustration and betrayal, back in the sewers on Nevarro. The child Din fought the entire Guild for. The child the rest of their Covert—including Paz himself—chose to give everything up to defend.

He thought it’d be...bigger. More significant, somehow—it was enough to bring a whole fucking Imperial Remnant down on their heads, after all. But it’s just a kid, cooing softly as it makes that universal “up, up” motion with its little arms, and Paz sighs and bends down to pick it up, unable to stop the warm swelling in his chest as the little one chirps happily and curls up against his chestplate. Foundlings are the future. And no matter how fraught his own personal history with Din is, no matter how much Paz thinks back on the past ten years with hurt and anger and deep, soul-shattering grief, he knows one thing: Din Djarin honors the Creed, as do they all.

Their Covert is destroyed now, their comrades scattered amongst the stars. But it’s worth it. For this little one with its happy smile and innocent eyes, it’s all worth it. 

“...details,” Peli says, and Paz blinks.

“What?”

She smirks as if knowing exactly how distracting the child can be, but dutifully repeats, “A few days after arriving here, Mando said he got something. Wouldn’t give me the details—not like I ask for ‘em anyway—paid me ahead to watch the kid, and took off. Ain’t seen him since.”

Paz nods. “How long ago was that?”

“Little over a week.”

A week. Fuck. If Din really is hurt...

“Okay.” The baby makes an unhappy noise when he lifts it away, but it calms when he rubs the tip of its ear before handing it back to Peli. She’s a mechanic, so... “The Razor Crest. When you worked on it, did it still have that Vyra model long-spectrum receiver on its port side?”

She blinks. “Yeah. But a beacon like that’s only supposed to turn on for the registered owner. Why would you...?”

Paz shrugs and busies himself inputting commands into his vambrace, face growing hot under his helm as he grumbles, “We bought it together.”

#

The beacon, as it turns out, pings them from Mos Eisley. If anything, that only gets Paz more worried. If the Crest is here on the planet, but Din hasn’t shown up to reclaim his child...it can only mean one thing. He’s not the one at the controls anymore.

He finds the old ship parked in a rundown hangar next to one of those seedy, obviously-black-market old compounds Din wouldn’t be caught dead in, the kind of place the Guild doesn’t touch, too fraught with backstabbing and casual violence. Fucking cliched, and Paz almost wants to laugh except there’s nothing funny about it, that the Crest has lost her owner, that he can see the building’s occupants drifting in and out through the front doors, all hulking, scarred-up humanoids who look like they eat Jawas for breakfast.

No way in hell he’s shooting his way in. Not only would that ruin any possibility of getting solid intel, just one of those giant hairy Kutubas could break him in half without a sweat. His guns are staying where they are.

But that doesn’t mean he’s out of options.

See, contrary to popular belief, Paz Vizsla doesn’t walk around picking fights everywhere he goes. Sure, given his size he tends to win most of them, but he’s a commander as well as heavy infantry. And any good tactician will tell you direct combat isn’t always the answer.

Sometimes, accomplishing an objective doesn’t involve guns or fists or glinting blades. Sometimes, you just gotta know what to say, and the right time to say it.

The monstrous Kutuba who answers his knock looks surprised to see him, though whether that’s because he’s a Mandalorian or because no one should ever bother to knock on the door to a black-market compound, he’ll never know. “Chu want?” they growl.

“I’m looking for someone,” Paz answers. The reaction is immediate, and exactly as he expected: the Kutuba draws up to their full height as, somewhere behind them in the darkness of the compound, the soft thrum of a half dozen blasters charging up sounds out. Paz clears his throat. “Not any of you,” he adds, which relaxes the Kutuba somewhat; they won’t risk a shootout if they can help it, not in a place full of valuables, so now they’ll be thinking of the fastest way to send him packing.

“Another Mando. Armored like me.” Again, some posturing, which tells him two things: Din did come by here before, and now they’re wondering if he’s come to cause trouble on his behalf. Paz takes a deep breath.

“I want his head.” 

Hook, line, and sinker: the Kutuba’s shoulders relax. Enemy of my enemy, and all that. In the giant humanoid’s mind, it’ll cause more trouble to pretend not to know Din and have Paz hanging around and asking more questions. And Paz obviously has something in common with them. Accordingly...

“Follow me,” they say, and lead him into the compound.

He’s taken to the back room, an office of sorts. The rest of the workers crowd in after him, some of them tall enough to brush the ceiling with their heads. There’s a giant desk near the back, and behind it sits a tiny Furrpan which, wow. This feels like one of those crappy old crime-mystery holos, it’s so goddamned cliched. 

The speckle-furred primate glances up and immediately narrows his eyes. “The hell’d you let him in for?”

“He got business wi’ da other one, boss,” the Kutuba rumbles. “Bad business.”

“That other Mando,” Paz says, making sure to maintain a relaxed stance. There are a lot of guns in this room. “I’m looking to kill him.”

“Ah.” The Furrpan rubs his little paws with a pleased smile. “Well, we seem to have saved you the trouble. He’s dead, or if not, well on his way to it.”

Low huffs of laughter from all around. Paz takes a deep breath, clamping down on the surge of anger.  _ Keep a lid on it. _ He’ll never find Din if he loses his cool now. 

Silence, at least, seems to be exactly what the Furrpan was looking for: true to his species’s talkative nature, he clicks his tongue and continues on. “I engaged his services to ferry me over to a three-ring vault a few systems over. You Mandos are just absolutely superb at lockbreaking, you really have no equal. Except maybe those Sanamai with their prehensile tentacles. Did you know I once moved not one but  _ two _ purses of Sanamai eggs across a full Imperial blockade? The Hutts were most pleased!

“Anyway, after we retrieved the contents of the vault—you’ll forgive me for not disclosing them to you—I locked him in. His ship is old but sturdy, you see, perfect for smuggling, and three-rings are impossible to open from the inside. And now here we are, problem solved on all fronts: I got my cargo and a free ship, and your rival has likely starved to death by now.” He stands up and bows with a flourish. “Is it not wonderful the way the universe works?”

“Yeah,” Paz bites out through gritted teeth, “It sure is.” 

And he unleashes his Whistling Birds.

The tiny missiles find their marks immediately; really, they shouldn’t  _ all  _ have decided to follow him into the room. As shouts and screams sound out all around, followed by the meaty thuds of large bodies hitting the floor, the Furrpan screeches and bolts for the nearest door which, cute.  _ Zing!  _ Paz’s grappling hook sinks into the little primate’s leg with a sharp  _ chik!  _ and a spray of blood and the Furrpan wails, clawing at the ground as Paz retracts the line, slamming his boot down onto a furry back and drawing his vibroblade.

“Where is he?”

“Pleasepleaseplease lemmego please I’ll pay you whatever you want pleaseplease—”

He leans down over the Furrpan and turns the blade on, taking comfort in its steady thrum as his captive screams and struggles beneath his boot. “Where. Is. He.”

“Fannayl-5! The vault’s on Fannayl-5! Ohplease oh holy Protector of the Great Jungle—”

But Paz doesn’t bother listening to the rest, sheathing his vibroblade and yanking the hook out to another chorus of shrieks and blubbery begging. The Furrpan curls up into a tiny ball, shaking all over, and he’s three steps toward the door, already plotting the fastest course to Fannayl in his head, when the little primate apparently decides to apply for Biggest Dumbass in the Galaxy.

“Wait!” 

He pauses, turns. There’s a high pitch of fear in the Furrpan’s voice, and desperation, but underneath it all is the greed, that delusion of invincibility only granted to the smallest of men as he props himself up on his little elbows, panting. “He’s dead, right?” he says. “And now all my men...but you,  _ you _ are one of a kind! The efficiency with which you kill, it’s admirable, desireable even! So why don’t you come work for me? I’ll make it worth your while, we’ve never had a Mando on the payroll before, and the other one was stupid but you’re smart so whaddaya say?”

Like Din’s nothing, just a piece of gunk to be scraped off the bottom of his shoe. Like he wasn’t once the bright, thrumming center of Paz’s entire world, a man he was proud to love, fierce and honorable and so kind...

He sighs and turns away from the door. The Furrpan grins up at him, panicked and too-wide, but the smile abruptly drops and his eyes get very big when Paz steps forward. 

“Well,” he says. “You just lost your chance at making it out of this alive.”

#

Several hours later, the Crest rumbles all around him as he enters Fannayl-5’s atmosphere.

It’s rather surprising how little Din’s actually changed the ship. Sure, there’re minor things: the copilot’s seat— _ his _ seat, once upon a time—has now been converted into a bassinet for the little one, the weapons locker in the main hold has an upgraded lock, and some of the panels along the hull look a little scratched up, like for some reason Din recently took the ship apart and then rather hastily put it back together again. But the main layout’s still mostly the same, from the fresher with its tiny sonic stall to the old folding medstation to the single-person rack bolted into the far wall. He almost checks to see if the extra panel still slides out, accommodating two people instead of just one, but stops himself. Din’s sleeping arrangements sure as hell aren’t his business anymore.

The scars on his back itch, right between the shoulder blades. Yeah, it hasn’t been his business in a long time.

The vault’s like every other multi-ring he’s seen: set into the side of a rocky hill, three giant concentric circles made of thick mag-iron, a glowing orb-shaped lock in the center glaring out like an angry orange eye. He pounds on the door first, hard enough to send echoes through the entire hill, but there’s no response. More likely than not the door’s just too thick for him to hear Din’s answer.

Or, you know. Din’s dead.

He’s not stupid. Paz has never been prone to nursing false hope, not after the shit he’s seen, so he knows even as he applies himself to breaking the lock that there’s a very good chance he’s going to find a corpse in there. Most Mandalorians carry a day’s supply of water and rations; those with bulkier armor like his own might carry twice that. But even if Din started out with full supplies and rationed them, he’d have run out of water, at least, four days ago.

The odds of Paz finding him alive are...not good.

Even so, he can’t just leave him here. If Din really is dead, then Paz owes it to him to bring his body home and give him a proper burial. Not just because that’s what the Creed dictates, but because, well. A long time ago he swore himself to Din’s side, as their Armorer proclaimed them clan and the Covert cheered around them. It doesn’t matter what shit went down between them since. He made a promise sworn on a sacred bond.

Din can fuck around with his word as much as he wants, but Paz Vizsla keeps his promises.

The lock pulses beneath his hands, bright orange glow fading into dull burnt brown as a series of ringing  _ clanks _ announces the vault opening. In steady, mechanical movements the three mag-iron circles sink back and then away into the rocky walls, and then it’s just Paz, staring into the murky darkness beyond, a large climate-controlled chamber lit only by dim smoky glow-lights.

The first thing he notices is the smell—or rather, the lack thereof, and his heart skips a beat. It should smell like death in here, but instead it just smells...vaguely musty, like old dried-up things, interspersed with something slightly sour. He steps forward, blinking as his HUD adjusts to the change in light. There’s a stack of old crates in one corner, and a pile of what looks like antique ammunition in another, and...

And between them lies a human figure, limp and unmoving.

“Din!” He nearly stumbles in his haste to scramble forward, falling to his knees next to the younger man. And it  _ is _ him: he’s still wearing his armor, though it’s dirty and stained, and his helm lies a few feet away so Paz can see his face in the dim smoky lights and...

Gods, he. He never thought he’d see this face again, hadn’t realized how much he missed it until it’s right in front of him. Din is...well, he’s  _ beautiful _ , always has been, and none of that’s changed with the passage of a decade—there are a few wrinkles now, sure, and a couple more scars, but it’s still the same face he remembers from before, that once smiled at him, warm and so kind, that crinkled up ridiculously when he laughed, that sometimes Paz would just spend hours studying, memorizing, because Din was  _ his _ and he was so much in love...

Din, watching him with eyes full of sorrow yet certainty, as he stood at the threshold of the room they shared and said,  _ I’m so sorry, Paz... _

Fuck. He blinks away the image and forces himself to focus back on the younger Mandalorian, lifeless and still as Paz lifts him up into his lap, brushing greasy, matted hair aside as he leans down, heart pounding. It’s not going to happen, he tells himself, stubborn. It’s been a week, Din’s long run out of water, he can’t possibly...

And then—there. A breath: soft and shallow yet there nevertheless, and something deep inside Paz, something small and stubborn that will always be wired to the man in his arms just explodes in warmth and shuddering relief. Holy shit, Din is  _ alive. _ Somehow or other, despite that Furrpan’s traitorous grin and the thick finality of the vault’s walls and the grindings of this vast universe that doesn’t give a shit about either of them, Din Djarin is alive. And Paz has found him again.

As if in response to his thoughts, Din’s eyelids flutter and he groans, a pitiful little whimper as gloved hands grasp weakly at Paz’s cuirass. “W...wa...”

“Shh.” And goddamn him but Paz can’t help but card his fingers gently through Din’s hair, hands trembling. “I got you. You’re okay.”

This close he finally picks out the source of that sour smell: it’s piss. A quick glance confirms Din’s pants are unclasped; the younger Mandalorian must’ve drank his own urine after the water ran out. A good survival tactic, standard in basic training, yet Paz’s heart still tightens in his chest as he gathers Din close with one hand and grabs for a hydration pill with the other. The little gray tablet cracks in his palm and instantly begins sucking up moisture from the air, dissolving into a small puddle of water that spills over his fingers even as he tips it to Din’s dry, cracked lips. “Here.”

It’s enough to bring tears to his eyes then, watching Din suckle weakly at the water in his hand, eyes only half-lidded like he can’t even summon the strength to open them completely. The younger man coughs most of it back up, fingers curling feebly over Paz’s vambrace as he blinks up at him, slow. “P-Paz...?”

“Yeah.” He tries a smile even though he knows Din can’t see it. “Surprise.”

“M...More...”

“No.” He gently disengages Din’s hold, stomach dropping at how easy it is, how Din doesn’t even try to fight him. “Your throat’s all closed up, you’ll choke. And how fucked up would that be, me going through all that trouble to get here just to have you die on my watch? That Peli woman’ll have my hide. Not to mention that kid of yours.”

Din just blinks and makes another low, weak noise when Paz bends down to pick him up, slinging the younger Mandalorian across his shoulders and fuck, he’s so fucking light, even with all that armor it’s like lifting a fucking doll and Paz grits his teeth and just keeps talking, fixing his gaze on the bright sunlight spilling through the vault door, Din limp and unresponsive against him. 

“And just so you know you owe me like, five thousand credits or whatever the fuck it was for me to get Peli to keep watching your kid, she’s greedier than a goddamned Toydarian, just not as ugly. And what the fuck were you thinking anyway, trusting a fucking  _ Furrpan? _ You know they’ve got more schemes than whiskers, the only thing you can trust ‘em to do is double-cross you at some point, why didn’t you get some fucking backup? Typical of your lone-wolf attitude, isn’t it, just going off to do things all on your fucking own...”

He knows he’s rambling, and probably putting Din through a guilt trip to boot, but he can’t stop. If he does he’ll probably cry, and that won’t do either of them any good so he keeps going, stomping up the Razor Crest’s ramp, Din so light across his shoulders, like most of him’s evaporated already. 

“Don’t worry, I took care of it,” he grumbles, setting Din carefully down on the edge of the rack. The younger man immediately lists sideways so Paz moves in next to him, propping Din’s dead weight against his chest as he goes about removing his armor. “Took out that furry fucker and all his stupid goons too. You’re welcome. Why is it that I’m always cleaning up your messes? And speaking of which, the fuck did you do to our ship, why are the hull panels all fucked up, did you just wake up one day and decide to—”

And then he sees it. And the world stutters to a halt.

The dim, naked lights of the Crest wash Din’s bare skin sallow and sickly pale. Nearly all his muscle has wasted away, each individual rib standing out stark beneath his skin, peppered with bruises and sores from when he must’ve grown too weak to move. And that—that in and of itself is a picture of horrors, enough to make Paz lose his breath with the fury, the helpless rage, the desperate burning desire to go back and bring that fucking Furrpan back to life just so he can kill him again,  _ slowly _ . 

But that’s not what actually gives him pause, because on some level due to training or expectation or just a lifetime of watching people be absolutely shitty to each other, he was prepared for this. The starkness of Din’s starving body, the signs that the younger man’s just spent the last few days digesting himself in order to survive...gods, it makes him so fucking angry but at least Paz was ready to deal with that, knows what he needs to do to get Din rehydrated and fed and on his way to healing. 

He wasn’t expecting the  _ meshur’rok _ .

For a few seconds he just stares at it, uncomprehending, nestled at the base of Din’s throat. The thin leather strap is worn and black as pitch, and the stone glints softly in the dim light. It’s even darker than he remembers, that deep sinking blue-almost-black peppered with glimmering bits like a scattering of stars. Reminiscent of the few precious minutes of twilight back on Mandalore, or at least that’s what Paz had been going for when he’d made it, spent a month working quietly in a corner of their Covert’s forge in the early hours of the morning while Din slept, his heart swelling with excitement and hope for the future as the symbol of their bond coalesced beneath his hands. 

To say Din had been over the moon when Paz took his hand and pressed the pendant into his palm would be the understatement of the millennium. Stupid as it is he still remembers the cadence of the younger man’s laugh that day, the way it trembled with barely-repressed tears as he buried his face in Paz’s shoulder helm and all, both of them shaking with love and gratitude and the huge, terrifying, magnificent, wonderful weight of what they’d just decided. 

The  _ meshur’rok _ —the bondstone—represents all that they were to each other. The formal ceremony within their Covert’s forge may have proclaimed their relationship to the galaxy at large, but it was the handmade pendants they both wore beneath their armor that sealed their personal bond, the quiet promises they made to each other outside of clan and Creed and the warrior’s Way. For almost a year Paz had worn Din’s  _ meshur’rok _ with pride and endless love, the cool comforting weight of that little stone at his throat grounding him in something he’d thought was unbreakable and everlasting.

But oh, what a fool he’d been. 

He remembers the glint of the stone at Din’s throat that final, fateful day, mocking him with its beauty even as the younger man turned and walked out the door, never looking back. 

Now he can’t help but stare at the traitorous drop of dark blue, stomach churning with confusion and anger because he can’t. He. Din doesn’t love him, he made that clear when he left, so what...what gives him the fucking  _ right _ to still be wearing this, as if he didn’t go and shatter Paz’s heart into a million pieces ten years ago, as if there’s anything left between them but pain and betrayal...

His fingers brush the stone and it’s like a live wire crackles to life: Din gasps and jerks, swatting weakly at his hand as something wild and panicked enters his eyes. “ _ N-No, _ ” he moans, breathless, frantic, and Paz quickly withdraws.

“Okay, okay.” Fuck, he can’t deal with this right now, not on top of everything else. And what good will it do anyway, to throw a hissy fit about the  _ meshur’rok _ now? It’s not like Din’s in any shape to give him an explanation.  _ Focus, Paz. _

That burst of movement, at least, seems to have taken out the last of Din’s energy because the younger man slumps against him then, breaths shallow and slow. He looks well on his way to unconsciousness, and Paz rather hopes he gets there because what’s about to happen is going to be mortifying for them both.

“Okay,” he murmurs, and isn’t sure who he’s trying to psych up. “Here we go.” And, looping his arms carefully beneath Din’s shoulders, he lifts him up and moves them both toward the fresher.

Din hardly seems to feel it, once again nothing but dead weight against Paz as he shuffles and shoves and eventually manages to fit them both into the narrow stall. It’s a tight fit; with his armor on he’s basically squishing Din into the wall but he can’t take it off and Din can’t stand up on his own, so there you go. He’s doing his best.

The younger man flinches and shrinks back against him when the sonics start up. Paz hums and strokes gently down Din’s back, feeling every bump and knob of his spine, every protruding bone as the little stall vibrates around them, sonic pulses cleaning a week’s worth of grime and piss and other stuff Paz doesn’t want to think about off Din’s emaciated body. And fuck, he  _ is _ emaciated, Paz can see basically his entire skeleton beneath dull, dry skin. There’s almost nothing left and he can’t help but tighten his hold, hating how even after all these years Din still fits against him like he was made for it, like they’re still the two halves of one whole Paz once believed them to be.

The sonics drop in pitch, low thrumming pulses bouncing painfully around Paz’s helm. It’s gonna fuck with his tinnitus, he just knows it, but somehow he can’t bring himself to care when Din lifts his head, eyes glassy, and licks his lips.

“H-Hungry,” he whispers, and fuck, if Paz’s heart wasn’t broken already it sure is now.

“I know.” He gathers the younger man closer, trying and failing to keep the tremor from his voice. “Just...in a minute, okay? We gotta get you clean first.”

Din doesn’t protest, probably couldn’t even if he wanted to. When the sonics shut off a couple minutes later and Paz looks back down his eyes have fallen closed, mouth half-open, and he doesn’t move or speak or anything as Paz gently picks him up and walks back over to the rack. As Din shivers in his arms then, head lolling against his chestplate, Paz pauses for a moment, considering.

He shouldn’t. He fucking shouldn’t. It won’t do him any good either way, it’s none of his fucking  _ business _ , why the hell would he even—

He kicks the tiny lever in the wall next to the rack. Beep.  _ Thunk! _ And his throat tightens as he stares down at the thick metal grate, at the extra panel that’s now slid out, doubling its width. Just the way he remembers.

Fuck.

Small blessings: at least Din’s still unconscious, quiet and unresponsive as Paz sets him down and pulls the thin, scratchy blanket up, tucking it carefully around the younger man’s thin body.

Dark blue glints in the light and he reaches down, weighing the  _ meshur’rok _ in his palm. Din doesn’t fight him this time, too far gone, and Paz swallows, rubbing his thumb gently over the stone, smooth and silky and warm with Din’s body heat.

The base of his own throat tingles, bare. What the hell does this even mean? He thought they were done, that Din had destroyed them. So then why did he keep Paz as a contact? Why is he still wearing his bondstone, like nothing has changed, like they’re still sworn to each other body and soul?

For the first time in a long time, something stirs to life at the bottom of his heart, worn down and beaten yet still vibrating with a tiny, traitorous warmth. Could...could he have missed something, all those years ago? When Din left, when Paz cursed his name and his own stupidity and threw his stuff together and got the hell out of their Covert, what if he was wrong? What if he misread, or left too fast, or—

The scars on his back tingle, sharp and abrupt. No. Fuck. He knows better. It doesn’t matter what Din wears around his neck. He’s the one who broke them. He’s the one who decided Paz wasn’t enough. 

He sighs and pulls his hand back, lets the deep blue stone settle back onto Din’s chest. It doesn’t matter now. Whatever Din’s reason for continuing to wear the  _ meshur’rok,  _ it’s been ten years. Paz has moved on. So what if sometimes he still thinks of Din when he’s alone in his rack at night, of soft eyes and a warm smile and the gentle brush of fingers over his own? He won’t—he  _ can’t _ put his heart through that again.

Din  _ left. _ And Paz is done hurting for him.

He straightens up and heads for the medstation. He’ll get some fluids and nutrients going, but it won’t be enough—he’ll need to make a stop somewhere civilized, consult with an actual doctor and get Din some of those heavy-duty replenishers. They’re fucking expensive but they’ll get the younger man back on his feet in a few days, and after that? 

After that, Paz is gone. He’ll make sure Din is good to go, will get him back to Peli and his kid, but after that he’ll tell him to wipe his info and he’ll leave. Because he doesn’t have a choice. If he stays, he’s fucked. Din has always been his only weakness.

And Paz knows exactly what to do with a weakness.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Glad you're all enjoying this so far. :) True to my reputation, though, expect some pretty painful stuff coming up.

Twelve hours later, trying to ignore the odd new lightness in his left arm, he trudges back up the ramp of the ship—and nearly drops everything.

“Oh, fuck—Din!”

At least the hangar they’re in is private and completely empty—everything on Vadashmir is like this, stupidly upscale and showy and fucking expensive—so there’s no one around to glimpse Din’s face as he blinks up at Paz from the floor next to the rack, thin blanket tangled around him, eyes glassy, skin sheet-white as his whole body trembles. “Y-You...”

“You fucking idiot!” Paz sets the crates down with a  _ clang _ —if those medcapsules crack he’s going to  _ kill _ Din, they’re like a thousand credits each because of course the pharmacies here charge a fortune for basic fucking supplies—and rushes forward. “Why are you out of bed—are you fucking crazy—”

He must grab Din harder than he means to because the younger man whimpers and flinches back at his touch. Paz bites his lip and takes a breath, forcing gentleness as he lifts Din back up and onto the rack. “Sorry,” he mutters, and it doesn’t sound even vaguely apologetic but he can’t even care because he’s just so  _ angry, _ just—the whole thing, seeing Din broken and helpless like this, it’s just so  _ wrong  _ and it does something to him, makes everything inside him itch and burn until all he wants to do is yell and put his fist through the nearest wall. 

But he can’t do that, not here, not in front of Din who just blinks pitifully up at him from the rack, miserable and weak, and Paz sighs. “I’m sorry,” he says again, softer. “I just...Jen’Issik, you pulled out your fucking line, would you just  _ think _ about things for once—”

Din mumbles something then, and Paz blinks. “What?”

The younger man drops his gaze, looking like he wants to just disappear into the thin blanket. “You left,” he whispers again, fingers curled loosely in the scratchy cloth.

_ You left first. _ The words bubble up in his throat, burning like acid. Paz swallows them back with effort. “Yeah, well, I’m back now so why don’t you just—”

“W-Woke...alone.” Din’s fingers brush the stone at his throat, an old, familiar motion like he’s not even aware he’s doing it, and Paz takes a shuddering breath as he whispers, “Like...th’vault.”

Issik help him. The anger rushes out of him in a wave, swept aside by freezing guilt. Fuck, he didn’t think...of course Din would freak upon waking alone, he just spent a whole fucking week locked in a tiny windowless room by himself, slowly dying of thirst and starvation. What else was he supposed to think when he woke up and Paz wasn’t there? Paz should’ve sedated him, should’ve left a note, should’ve...

Should’ve done a lot of things.

Sighing, he reaches down to card his fingers through Din’s soft hair, scritching gently at his scalp. It calmed him back when they were together and it seems to work now: Din murmurs and settles, eyelids fluttering closed. The IV is a loss, the thin transparent line still dripping fluid slowly as it hangs off the edge of the rack, but that’s all right. As with everything else, Paz’ll figure it out.

The replenisher capsule is a slim little thing, sleek and minimalist and exactly what you’d expect of one of the best advances in medical technology the galaxy has ever come up with. Din makes an unhappy little noise when it adheres itself to his upper arm, hundreds of tiny microneedles sinking into his skin, but he calms when Paz brushes a palm over his shoulder and barely responds when he inserts the nutrient canister into the slot with a hiss. According to the stupidly expensive doctor here, the complete course should get Din back to full function in four canisters, each one administered daily. Like hell they’re staying here for that, though; Vadashmir’s cost of living would run them dry in a day, Paz’s ability to barter or no. But wasn’t there that little planetoid they passed on the way here, small and quiet and out of the way, maybe he can—

The sudden grip on his hand scares the shit out of him. Din blinks up at him, slow, yet something in his eyes shines clear as he whispers, “Stay.”

To say Paz has complicated feelings about that would be like saying the Emperor was just a little mischievous. He swallows, a million answers flitting through his mind.  _ I can’t. Yes. No. Always. _

Lothir’s tits. He shakes his head. “Din...”

“P-Please.” The younger man’s words start to slur as his eyelids flutter. He squeezes Paz’s fingers, weak. “Stay.”

_ If you love me at all, don’t come after me. _

Din’s losing his fight with unconsciousness, breaths slowing as his mouth goes slack. Paz says nothing, just watches as those thin, bird-brittle fingers gradually loosen their hold, forcing his own hands to remain still even as everything inside him howls with sorrow and want, that part of him that has always looked at Din and thought  _ yes  _ and  _ forever _ screaming for him to just  _ listen, _ to gather Din up and never let go and fuck what went down between them,  _ Din’s here now,  _ he’s got another chance and maybe this time, this time they’ll do it right...

But he can’t. He fucking  _ can’t. _

As Din’s fingers fall from his, entire body going limp as he surrenders to sleep, Paz hangs his head and, within the safety of his helm, lets out a long, shuddering breath, shaky and wet and heavy with a decade of grief.

_ Stay,  _ Din said.

_ But why didn’t you? _

__

#

Ghessini-XI is exactly what they need: quiet and isolated, too small to attract settlements yet with enough large populated planets nearby to discourage criminals from seeking refuge. There’s no intelligent life here, just a vast forest dotted with streams and clearings and a beautiful crystal-blue lake. In short, it’s perfect.

For Din, anyway. Paz, as it turns out, is a bit of a different story.

He’s got no idea what the hell is going on. He’s always been generally healthy—hardly ever gets sick, and he even once managed to fight off a full bout of Manghine flu without even needing to amputate anything. Ghessini’s not particularly weird in terms of atmosphere or environment either; in fact it’s downright boring, that was the whole point of bringing Din here. So Paz really has no idea why, almost as soon as he steps off the Crest, his throat starts itching and his nose stuffs up. 

Still, it’s a minor thing, and he’ll be damned if he’s going to pack them up and leave just because he’s all of a sudden developed a random alien allergy. Din needs a few days to lie low and get his strength back. Paz can just pop a fry pill and deal.

He finishes laying a perimeter—Ghessini doesn’t seem to have any large predators, but you can never be too careful—and heads back for the ship, only to pause at the ramp. “Oh. You’re up.”

Seated on the edge of the rack, blanket wrapped around his thin shoulders and looking like he was recently trampled by a herd of stampeding banthas, Din sends him a small, tired smile. “Yeah, I...yeah. I am.”

The silence that descends then is awkward, to say the least. Paz clears his throat. “How’re you feeling?”

“Ah, okay.” Din draws the blanket a little tighter around himself. “Better than before.”

He either hasn’t noticed—unlikely—or doesn’t care—more likely—that his helm is still lying across the way next to his personal locker. The  _ meshur’rok _ glints from the shadow at the base of his throat. Paz swallows and looks away. “Good. Think you can manage some broth?”

“Probably. My throat feels better, at least.”

Paz grunts and makes his way over to one of the supply crates. As he pulls out a broth portion and starts poking around for a cup, Din’s voice floats to him over his shoulder. “So, uh. Where are we?”

“Tiny little moon on the outskirts of the Minn-Rabina System.” A few drops of water and the mixture in the cup instantly starts to bubble, slowly but surely expanding into a steaming pool of dark green fluid. It’s absolutely fascinating, much more so than Din’s face. “We’ll be safe here for the next few days at least, until you’re done with those replenishers.”

“Oh.” Din glances down at the capsule embedded in his arm and frowns. “Huh. I’ve never actually seen one of these before. Aren’t they supposed to cost—”

“Here.” Paz shoves the cup at him. “Drink it while it’s hot.”

The younger man obeys. It’s a close thing; his hands shake badly as he brings the cup to his lips, but he manages it and Paz nods and turns away, looking for something else to focus on because fuck, he  _ hates _ seeing Din like this. “Does anything hurt? I didn’t see any major injuries, uh. Under the sonics.”

Din blinks up at him, guileless. Paz looks away. How much does the younger man even remember from last night? For both their sakes, he hopes not a lot.

Din, bless him, finally just shrugs and takes another sip of broth. “No. Getting beat up by a Furrpan? I’d never live that down.”

He grins, small and lopsided but genuine, and Paz can’t help the way the corner of his own mouth pulls up. “No, you wouldn’t.”

“What’d you do with him?”

“You really wanna know?”

“Hm.” Din glances back down at his cup. “Guess not.”

The silence that falls then is a far cry from comfortable, but it’s not mind-numbingly awkward either. There used to be a time when they could sit quietly with one another for hours, doing their own things and entirely content to just share the same space. Will they ever get to that point again? For that matter, does Paz even want to?

“So how did you find me?” Din asks then. He sounds genuinely curious, so Paz shrugs.

“The port-side receiver. I never got a deregistration ping.”

He doesn’t quite mean for the end of that sentence to lilt upward, making it more of a question than a statement. But the truth is, when he entered those commands into his vambrace back in Peli’s hangar, he wasn’t expecting it to actually work, for the database to actually come back with the exact coordinates for the Razor Crest. If anything he assumed Din had taken his name off the register a long time ago, and just some lazy admin-droid or a hiccup in the system made it so he was never notified. It would certainly make more sense than the younger Mandalorian for some reason deciding to keep him on as the Crest’s co-owner all these long, lonely years.

But at the end of the day he’s grateful for it: if Din really had deregistered him Paz might still be stuck on Tatooine chasing false leads while the younger man starved to death. So Paz can’t be angry at him for it, not when Din’s oversight or laziness or whatever the hell it was resulted in him still being here and alive. 

He just wishes he understood why. First the  _ meshur’rok _ and now this—it’s like Din’s refusing to play by the rules, throwing out the script Paz expected for a situation like theirs. It makes him feel slow, like he’s missed something important, and he doesn’t like that at all.

Last time he and Din were in close quarters and Paz missed something, he lost the most important relationship in his life.

Din, for his part, takes a moment to blink down at the cup in his hands. It’s empty, so Paz steps forward to take it back just as he says, “I have to tell you someth—wait.” 

Fingers seize Paz’s wrist, surprisingly strong and he just barely manages to keep from yanking his arm back as Din stares at him. Or, more specifically, at the empty spot below his left shoulder. “Where’s your rerebrace?”

Fuck. Of course it’s the first thing Din notices. Paz sighs and disengages his grip. “Pawned it.”

“What?” Din somehow manages to look affronted, startled, tired, and angry at the same time as he stares up at Paz, frowning. “What the hell for?”

It’s honestly kind of warming to see him so offended. Paz doesn’t blame him; that rerebrace was his last remaining piece of beskar outside his cuirass and his helm. And he sure as shit can’t sell those off. 

But what choice did he have? Beskar’s still a precious commodity, accepted the galaxy over as payment for goods and services. And Din was so fucking thin and looked ready to die any moment and the only good doctors are on Vadashmir...

He sees it the instant Din realizes: the younger man looks down at the replenisher on his arm, then back up at Paz as slow horror creeps into his expression. “Paz.  _ No. _ ”

Paz sighs. “Look, it’s no big deal, I got other supplies too—”

“But that was.” Din swallows, the  _ meshur’rok _ bobbing at his throat. “Paz, that piece came from your grandfather’s armor, you—”

And fuck no, they are not doing this. He’s not a fucking  _ child, _ he can do with his armor as he pleases and it’s not like Din has any fucking right to dictate him anyway, now does he? “Pretty sure he’s too dead to care,” he snaps, and the younger Mandalorian actually has the fucking balls to glare at him.

“Will you be serious for once? Your grandfather—”

“My grandfather would’ve preferred my husband didn’t die on me!”

Silence. Din stares at him, eyes wide, and Paz thanks the gods for his helm as his face flushes hot from his ears all the way down his neck. “Ex,” he grinds out.

Fuck. Why the fuck...this isn’t how it’s supposed to go. He’s supposed to get Din back on his feet, take him back to Tatooine, and then move on with his life—it’s what he’s been doing for the past ten years, after all, and it’s kept him safe, kept him from falling back into the swirling vortex of hurt and betrayal that is the deepest relationship he’s ever known. Hell, he shouldn’t even be here—Din should be with his friends, the people he actually wants to be with, rather than the old, scarred soldier who was never enough to keep him around.

They never officially divorced. Never had the chance, really, after Din left and Paz decided not to sit around waiting for him. Even back on Nevarro, in the last place he’d have ever expected to run into Din again, they hadn’t known how to act around each other, as uncomfortable and distant as strangers. Did the Armorer even know they were married? He doubts it, with how studiously they avoided each other in the darkness of the sewers.

But it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter that their connection was never officially dissolved, that Paz has spent the past ten years bonded to someone who made it clear he never wanted to see him again. They were never meant to be together; the last decade—and the scars on Paz’s back—are more than proof of that. 

Then Din opens his mouth, that stubborn glint in his eyes saying he wants to push the issue, and Paz just—he can’t deal with this right now. “You done?” he asks—growls, really, and Din blinks and looks down at his empty cup like he didn’t expect it to still be there.

“Yeah, I...yes. I’m done.”

“Good.” Refusing to look at him, Paz strides forward and snatches the cup up from unprotesting fingers. “Then get dressed. We gotta walk you.”

“Excuse me?”

Din still wrinkles his nose in the most adorable way when he’s confused. Goddamnit. “Doc said you need to move around, it’ll help those fancy nano-whatevers in the replenishers build you back up faster. So throw something on. I’ll be outside.”

Then he turns and stomps down the ramp. It’s absolutely shitty—Din could barely hold the cup by himself, how is he supposed to get into his undersuit—but Paz doesn’t care. He just—he can’t stay here, with Din watching him like he’s something precious. Because he’s not. How could he be, when he couldn’t even get his own husband to stick around?

Outside, Ghessini’s orange-yellow sun is just starting to slant into afternoon. The lake ripples softly in the distance, and some sort of creature belts out a repeated bird-like whooping call, echoing through the trees. Probably looking for a mate or something. Well, good fucking luck.

His wrist itches, and away from prying eyes Paz pulls off a glove and vambrace, tracing his fingers over the scars on his forearm: a series of neat parallel rings forming a band several inches wide. Scarring like this is the only carryover he’s allowed himself from his past, a piece of his dead homeworld in every raised, purposeful bump carved into his skin. He’s got other patterns all over his body too, imparting lessons and celebrating victories, but he’d only gotten the bands upon marrying Din, the matching set on each arm a symbol of their connection, their bond, their oath to look after each other until the end of their days.

He remembers getting them, how instead of asking their medic to perform the scarring as he’d done for all his other marks, Paz had actually sought out a fellow refugee from his homeworld, an old once-shaman living in a rundown shanty somewhere in the Outer Rim. It just felt right, an appropriate reflection of the importance of this set of scars in his life, and Din sat with him in the old man’s hut, holding his free hand as the knife cut deep, over and over. 

Back then, had he already started having his doubts? Was he already planning his escape, even as he watched Paz carve the symbol of their bond into his skin?

Footsteps approach from behind him, shuffling and slow. Quickly Paz yanks his glove back on and turns—and has to clamp down on the sudden urge to rush forward. Din looks like absolute shit: he’s shaking all over, sweat beading on his forehead, and his skin where it’s not covered by his tunic is so pale it’s like he’s got no blood left in him. The undersuit hangs off him like he’s a foundling playing dress-up, only half the buttons done up and Paz grits his teeth and steps forward, finishing them up as gently as he can.

“You...” Din blinks at him, listless, and Paz shakes his head. “Fuck it. I’m sorry. Let’s just get you back into bed—”

“No.” A tiny little smile, shot through with exhaustion. “Doctor’s orders, right? I’ll be okay.”

It’s a fucking lie.

They barely make it a quarter klick. Already unsteady on his feet to start with, Din struggles with every step, sweating and shaking even before they reach the treeline. He’s so damned thin Paz expects a bone to break every time he stumbles, which is a lot. Yet still he keeps going, panting like he’s run a thousand miles, face set in a grimace of stubbornness and pain and it’s all Paz can manage not to intervene, to throw Din over his shoulder and get him back to the ship to tuck him away warm and safe from the world. 

He doesn’t, though. He no longer has the right.

By the time they get back in view of the Crest the younger Mandalorian looks ready to collapse, every step slow and stumbling as he leans almost his entire weight against Paz, gripping his arm like his life depends on it. And it just might, really, because he very nearly faceplants right into the ground when Paz has to disengage him to lower the ramp, and with a sigh he bends down and picks Din up and carries him the last few steps into the main hold.

Din doesn’t seem to mind—or notice, for that matter. It’s like he’s right back to where he started when Paz first hauled him out of that vault, limp and near-unresponsive as Paz lowers him carefully onto the rack, and just. Fuck. He’s such an idiot. What if Din dies because he can’t keep a rein on his temper? He’d never forgive himself.

Beneath the blanket Din murmurs, soft, a tiny little furrow forming between his brows like he’s dreaming something unpleasant. Paz reaches down and tucks the blanket more carefully around him, swallowing against the sudden tightness in his throat.

It doesn’t matter their history, what Paz may or may not still feel for this man who once made up the shining core of his whole universe. Din needs him, and Paz has to do better. He  _ will _ do better.

That, at least, is a promise he intends to keep.


	3. Chapter 3

Fishing has never been his strong suit.

It’s not that Paz is bad at it, necessarily; he passed the module in survival training just fine. It’s just that, while other people seem perfectly okay with standing bent over the water holding a handmade trap for hours, waiting for the fish to come to them, Paz just doesn’t have the patience for it. He’s the type of guy whose response to most problems is to shoot at it until it goes away, and the fish here are gigantic delicious-looking motherfuckers and he’s fucking hungry, and if one of the damned things doesn’t swim in in another two minutes he’s hurling a grenade into this goddamned lake.

It doesn’t help that he woke this morning feeling like absolute shit. It’s gotta be that goddamned allergy, or maybe he slept wrong, propped up against the wall in full armor. He probably should’ve camped outside, at least he would’ve had the opportunity to stretch out, but remembering how Din freaked the first time he hadn’t been keen on the younger man waking up alone again. And Paz has definitely slept in worse places, so he really has no idea why his body is having a problem with it now, but there you go.

As it stands, his shoulders ache as he crouches over the water, and his back feels like it’s on fire. The water itself is cool but he feels hot all over, achy, and his throat is dry and he can’t stop coughing. It’s a good thing he replenished their supplies on Vadashmir; he’ll try a double dose of those fry pills when he gets back to the ship. This damned bug has gotta shrivel up and die at some point, right?

At least Din seems to be faring better. He passed out after their walk yesterday and slept right through the night, and as far as Paz knows he sleeps still, curled up under the blanket like a child. He’ll need to hurry back if he’s to get there before he wakes, but the fish still aren’t coming and his back hurts like a bitch and...

Ah, fuck it. Tossing the trap away, he straightens up and lifts his vambrace, aiming it at the silvery shapes flitting about in the water.

Let’s see who comes out on top now, motherfuckers.

Fifteen minutes later he makes his way back to the Crest, three fat glistening fish hanging from his grappling hook’s tether. If his old instructors want to call it cheating then so be it. At least he didn’t use any explosives.

Din’s still asleep, a formless lump beneath the blanket, so he dry-swallows a couple pills and sets about making a fire. The fish are easy enough to gut and clean and toss into a small cookpot, and the morning’s rather nice now that he’s no longer knee-deep in cold water. When was the last time he camped by a lake? Maybe that one time six years ago, when he’d still been a part of Allis Davinion’s crew. Wonder what that crazy old Koobian’s up to now. Probably still trawling the asteroid belts looking for his big break, telling bawdy jokes as he guzzles that godawful fermented  _ khul _ -ale...

“Morning.”

Din hovers halfway down the ramp, blinking at the black pot steaming over the flames. Paz’s first thought is that that second replenisher capsule did its job: the younger Mandalorian seems to have had no problem dressing himself this time, tunic neatly buttoned. His second thought is that Din could still use some more sleep, but the younger man doesn’t seem to mind the dark circles under his eyes, offering a small smile. “That, uh. That smells really good.”

“It’d better, since it’s your breakfast.”

Din must hear the apology under the gruffness because his smile brightens as he picks his way forward and settles on the ground across the fire. The replenishers are definitely working: the younger man’s cheekbones don’t look nearly as hollow, and he seems to have filled out some, the undersuit no longer hanging off him like a dead flag. His eyes, too, have regained some of their brightness, sharp and aware instead of dull and glassy, and they squinch up just the way he remembers when Din looks at him and abruptly grins, a little silly.

“What’s funny?” Paz asks, and Din just nods downward.

“You still take off your gloves when you cook.”

Paz blinks and looks down at his bare hands, scarred and callused in the bright morning light. He hadn’t even noticed. 

Din must misinterpret his silence because his smile wavers. Paz clears his throat. “Yeah, well, we can’t all be barbarians, now can we?”

A soft chuckle. “Says the guy who once punched a diplomat in the face because, quote, ‘He was getting boring.’”

“He was telling me  _ statistics about grain _ . And at least I didn’t shoot him.”

“Mmhm. Tell me again how you got these fish?”

Paz rolls his eyes, biting his cheek to keep from grinning as he shoves a steaming bowl forward. “Shut up and eat your soup, smartass.”

Din laughs and shakes his head, then pauses. “You’re not having any?”

Paz just shrugs and gestures vaguely at his helm. “Maybe later.”

He misses Din’s reply then, hit by another sudden round of coughing, phlegmy and gross. “Agh. Sorry. What?”

The younger man narrows his eyes, lips pressed together like he’s considering commenting, but then he apparently thinks better of it because he just nods at the still-steaming pot. “You don’t have to.”

“Have to what?”

“Wait till later.” Din’s voice is light, but there’s no mistaking the way he’s all of a sudden having trouble meeting Paz’s gaze. “We’re, uh. You know. Technically still married.”

Paz just stares. Din ducks his head, suddenly extremely interested in his soup as his face flushes dark red. Paz himself isn’t doing much better, cheeks hot beneath his helm because, well,  _ look  _ at them. They’re  _ not _ married, not in any way that counts. Spouses don’t spend ten years pointedly trying to stay on opposite sides of the galaxy. They don’t give each other the silent treatment for months in the dark sewers beneath a bazaar before finally blowing up and getting into a knife fight over something as stupid as Imperial-stamped beskar. And they certainly don’t just  _ abandon  _ each other a year into their marriage, claiming they need space or to find themselves or some bullshit like that when everyone knows they just consider the whole thing a mistake.

But then he looks at Din, at the tight line of the younger man’s shoulders and the way he’s hunched into himself like a young child expecting a blow. He’s taking a risk, offering a hand across the wide yawning chasm between them, and would it really be so bad? They can never go back to what they were before, not after all this time, and it’s a terrible idea, it really, really is. But it’s also not like Din’s wrong, and last night, watching as the younger man sank into exhausted sleep, Paz promised to do better, didn’t he? 

Maybe it starts here. Maybe this is where Paz chooses to become a better Mandalorian and a man, not because he married Din but perhaps in spite of it.

A chorus of birds breaks out in high, trilling song somewhere far off in the forest. Across the fire, Din clears his throat. “Never mind. I shouldn’t have assumed...”

The words trail off when Paz grasps his helm and lifts it up over his head. 

Without the filter of his visor Ghessini’s blue sky comes through even brighter than before, the lake shimmering in the distance along with the stark pale green of the shifting trees. The smells hit too: the spice and heat of the soup first, and the smokiness of the fire, and then the scent of the moon itself, leaves and water and freshly-turned earth. He lets himself breathe it for a moment, then picks up a bowl and pokes at the stew. “You didn’t eat the  _ takan _ root, did you? That’s just for flavor.”

When no reply comes he sighs, lifting his head just enough to arch an eyebrow. “Oy. I haven’t gotten that ugly in ten years.”

“No, I...” Din blinks and straightens up, looking away for a second, but then can’t seem to stop himself from staring again. There’s something...off about his look, surprise mixed with confusion and sadness, but before Paz can ask he says, low, “Your, uh. Your hair.”

Oh, that’s right. Paz reaches up to slide his palm over the back of his head, rubbing at the smooth, bare skin. “Yeah, I got rid of the dreads a few years back. It was time.”

He’s not going to tell Din how the long, tight braids are almost impossible to upkeep on his own, or how his hands shook so hard he cut himself several times shaving it all off. It was the final decision, the last nail in the coffin of their marriage. With that single act Paz solidified the fact that they’d never be together again—that he would be alone for the rest of his life.

But Din doesn’t need to know that.

He clears his throat. “If it makes you feel any better I kept overcompensating and smacking into things the first week,” he says, ladling soup into his bowl. “There was a Chiglian on the crew I was running with at the time, and he thought I was keeping a stash of ale somewhere and ransacked my locker. I kicked his ass to the next quadrant.”

Din laughs, soft. “That must’ve been surreal to witness. Chiglians are what, two feet tall?”

“Yeah. Perfect groin head-butting height, in case you were wondering.”

“ _ Ouch. _ And yet you still don’t wear armor there.”

“A real Mandalorian can take a hit to the balls.”

“A real Mandalorian plans ahead to avoid it.”

“I can’t help but notice you don’t wear a codpiece either.”

“Yeah. Because I  _ dodge. _ ”

Paz chuckles at that, then pauses when Din’s eyes widen. “What?”

“Nothing.” The younger man peers down at his bowl, corner of his mouth curved up like he can’t help it. “Just...I missed your laugh. I...I’d forgotten what it sounds like.”

And it’s so damned soft, quiet and innocent and so very  _ Din _ that the anger can’t even take hold, painted over with tenderness and a dangerous warmth. His husband always did have a direct line to his heart. “Yeah, well, don’t get used to it,” he grumbles, though it doesn’t come out nearly as brusque as he intended, judging from the way Din’s eyes soften.

After breakfast, they take another turn in the woods. Din makes it almost a mile this time, and halfway through Paz makes some comment about a colorful fluorescent bird circling overhead, and Din says  _ it’s iridescent, actually _ and Paz says why doesn’t the fancy professor go fuck himself, and it’s nice. Way better than the anger, and even though that small part of him still throws up alarm bells about how he’s going to regret this,  _ we all know how this ends, Vizsla, _ he tries to ignore it. They’re no longer partners or even really friends, but that doesn’t mean Paz can’t be civil. Din deserves it, after everything he’s been through.

By the time they get back to the ship the younger man is tiring, eyelids drooping as his steps start to slow. He’s not the only one, though; sometime during their walk Paz managed to develop a splitting headache in addition to all that crap from the morning. A midday nap sounds heavenly.

As if on cue the younger Mandalorian yawns, blushing when he sees Paz watching. “Guess I need those replenishers after all.”

“Yeah. I’ll take care of it and then you can rest.”

Din frowns. “Try to get some sleep too. You don’t look too good.”

“Yeah.” He’s too tired to argue, and the fact that it feels like the Armorer’s trying to split his skull open with her hammer doesn’t help. “That might be a good idea.”

Din shakes his head. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this sick, not unless you count that Vereynian bug that got all of us back on Chinchett.”

Boy, that one had been nasty. Pro tip: one’s Armorer can always be prevailed upon to issue an emergency suspension of the Creed once everyone starts throwing up in their helms. And he  _ still _ doesn’t know who Patient Zero was. Probably that dumb fuck Aryn, fancying himself some sort of connoisseur and always getting into some new meat or strain of plant, it was only a matter of time—

The soft touch to his forehead brings him up short. Din doesn’t seem to notice, that little furrow pinching between his brows as his palm presses to Paz’s skin, dry and callused. “You’re running a fever,” the younger man says. “I don’t know how high, we’ll have to get back to the ship to—”

And then his eyes widen and he scrambles abruptly back. “Oh, shit! Shit, I’m so sorry, I-I didn’t mean to...”

He looks so panicked, eyes wide and face flushed with embarrassment and shame, and Paz  _ knows _ he should be mad, has every right to lay into Din for this blatant violation and stomp up onto the Crest and slap his helm on for the remainder of their time here, but. But he’s just so damned  _ tired, _ and hurting, and it’s been so long since anyone’s touched him and an alarmingly large part of him kind of just wants to tip forward into Din and just burrow into the younger man until his head stops pounding.

He can’t do that, of course—doesn’t  _ want _ to do that. It’s just been a long couple of days and he’s not feeling well, and neither of those things are Din’s fault.

He sighs and pushes past the other man. “It’s fine.”

Din follows him, voice small. “I really am sorry, I didn’t think—”

“It’s  _ fine, _ Djarin. Just don’t do it again.”

The journey up the ramp seems interminably long, but he manages it. As Din shuffles quietly behind him Paz goes poking around for another replenisher capsule. But it’s hard. He can’t seem to focus, his head hurts so damned much and his vision is starting to swim and he doesn’t remember the supply crate being this much of a mess, just where the hell did he put the fucking things...?

“Paz?” 

He really should tell Din not to stand so close, especially given what just happened, but that would require thinking past the throbbing in his skull and...just...nothing’s working right now. The younger man frowns and lifts a couple of thin silver capsules in his palm. Oh. “You laid them out next to the fresher last night,” Din says. “You don’t remember?”

“Of course I remember,” Paz grumbles, except maybe it doesn’t come out quite as coherent as he thinks because Din’s frown only deepens, real concern flickering in his gaze.

“I...I really think you should lie down,” Din says then, and oh, like he’s one to fucking talk, and Paz turns on him, angry, except that turns out to be the absolute  _ worst  _ thing he could have done because all of a sudden the world slams sideways, an explosion of pain in his head and fireworks of swirling colors all across his vision, and he has just enough time to register Din’s eyes going wide and his husband’s mouth forming his name before everything goes black.


	4. Chapter 4

_ He stares at Din, uncomprehending. Their little shared room swirls around him, colors shifting and blurring as his heart rabbits in his chest. “I...I don’t understand.” _

_ His husband sighs. Even now, wearing rusted durasteel armor with his cape all raggedy at the bottom—Paz had intended to patch it tonight—he’s still so goddamned beautiful, the strong line of his jaw and the softness of his eyes gleaming with a sadness so infinite, so unerringly deep, and he’s here and looking at Paz and yet he’s never felt so out of reach. “What more is there to say? I’m leaving, Paz.” _

_ “But...but I...” He swallows, hard. He’s having trouble with his words, he gets like that sometimes when he’s stressed, and Din  _ knows  _ that so why isn’t he trying to explain more, why isn’t he meeting Paz halfway like he always said he would? “Are you coming back?” _

_ Din blinks, rapid, and looks away. “I don’t know,” he says, and his voice drops. “I don’t think so.” _

_ “But  _ why? _ ” _

_ He’s never done anything to make his husband unhappy. In fact, this entire past year since they got married Paz has been doing his damnedest to give Din everything he wants. He’s been faithful, loyal, forced himself to smile and encourage Din on his bounties even as his heart seized up with worry, and he thought he was doing it right. Sure, the last few weeks he’s noticed his husband getting more quiet, a little more withdrawn, not laughing as much and spending hours on end working on the Razor Crest, but they’re Mandalorians: they all have their own shit going on, they’re all prone to bouts of depression and weird moods every once in a while given all the shit they’ve seen. He’s tried to give Din space, and he thought they were getting better. He never expected this. _

_ He never saw it coming. _

_ Din swallows. The  _ meshur’rok _ bobs at his throat, dark blue stone glinting in the dim light of their quarters. Paz’s heart turns over in his chest, even as he feels the matching weight of the jewel hanging from his own neck. They did everything right. Din made a  _ promise.

_ “It’s not you,” Din says at last, and Paz almost laughs because oh sure, of course, his husband must just be leaving and turning his back on their entire fucking marriage on a total whim. “I just...I’m not sure I want this, Paz. I’m so sorry. I thought I did when we were courting, and then the wedding was so great and I love you so fucking much, really I do, but I. Just.” He blows out a frustrated breath. “You’ve been talking about  _ kids, _ Paz, and all your plans for the future. And I get it, it’s important to you and I’d never want to take that away, but...” _

_ The world is spinning. That’s what this is about? Yes, he wants a family, he’s not getting any younger and it’s the logical next step, but he only just started bringing it up, testing the waters and Din has been so receptive, hasn’t he, smiling and nodding along and Paz just thought... “I thought you wanted it too. I thought—” _

_ “ _ Jen’Issik, _ Paz, I don’t  _ know _ what I want!” The anger is sudden and sharp and Paz can’t help but flinch back, and he  _ hates  _ it, he shouldn’t be afraid like this but it’s like he can’t help it, it’s too much. He was never trained for this. It was never supposed to happen. _

_ He was never supposed to experience this sort of betrayal. _

_ Din’s expression softens. “I’m sorry,” his husband says. “It’s just...I’m  _ twenty-five _ , Paz. I just don’t know if I want the things you want, and I could just continue on and pretend like nothing’s wrong but I don’t want to. It’s not fair to me, or to you.” _

_ He takes a deep breath. “You can have the Crest if you want,” he says. “I’ve got a ride with one of my Guild contacts. I’ll try to keep in touch but...maybe don’t expect it.” _

_ And then he’s turning, hefting his helm and striding toward the door and just  _ leaving him here _ and Paz can’t—this isn’t happening, Din loves him, he has to be enough to get his husband to stay— _

_ “Please.” The voice is so small, so utterly heartbroken and young he barely even recognizes it as his own. “Husband. Please don’t leave me.” _

_ Din turns back at that. His eyes shine, glistening with grief and sadness and a solid determination even as no tears fall. “If you love me at all, don’t come after me,” he whispers. _

_ The door swishes open, then closed. And his husband is gone. _

_ In the sudden, deafening silence of the room, Paz stares at the space where Din used to be. He can’t breathe, can’t think. Din left. He courted Paz, said all the right things, made Paz love him and marry him and swear to him all the sacred promises tucked away at the bottom of his heart, and in the end he tossed Paz aside like a plaything he’d finished with. Because that’s all Paz Vizsla is: a passing amusement. Something to be admired and claimed, and then abandoned. _

_ He won’t ever be enough. Not for Din, not for anybody.  _

_ The weight of the  _ meshur’rok _ around his throat grows suddenly heavy, the thin leather cord tightening like a fist. Murderous. Suffocating. A complete and entire lie. _

_ Reaching up, he grabs the little stone and yanks it from him. Hurls it across the room. Wishes desperately for it to break, just like his heart. _

__

#

He comes to fighting, jerking up with a gasp as the world slams in, everything bright colors and swirling lights and he can’t breathe, he’s not safe, everything’s upside-down and sideways and he has to  _ get the fuck out of here— _

“Paz!” Strong hands grip his shoulders, firm, as Din’s face swims out of the swirling darkness, eyes wide. “Paz, baby, you gotta breathe, you’re panicking—Paz, no, will you just—fucking  _ stop moving! _ ”

And whether it’s the sharpness of Din’s tone or the way Din shakes him, hard, Paz blinks and the world finally settles. Awareness rushes back in: ten years, Tatooine, finding Din in the vault. They’re on Ghessini, aboard the Razor Crest. He’s safe.

Or at least as safe as he can be, in Din Djarin’s hands.

Sudden agony flares up in his shoulder and he winces, glancing down at the bright, clean bandages there. “What...What happened?”

Din sits back on his heels then, a myriad of expressions flitting across his face: anger and hurt and worry, and something deeper Paz doesn’t even want to consider. “You’re a fucking idiot, that’s what happened,” he hisses, and as Paz stares the younger man swallows and glares at him, fierce. “You didn’t think it was, I dunno,  _ maybe _ important to mention you’d been stung by Breskilians recently?”

What? But that was days ago. “What’s that got to do with—”

“They’re  _ venomous, _ Paz!” Din throws up his hands with a grimace. “Of all the fucking—you weren’t sick, you were  _ poisoned! _ I had to burn through all our toxin eaters just to save your stupid life!”

And he looks so indignant, so utterly pissed Paz can’t help the dark cloud of shame that gathers in his heart, sucking and shrinking everything down. Of course Breskilians would be fucking venomous, and of course Paz didn’t do enough research to know that before going in. Look at that: Paz Vizsla fucks up again. Not even a week back with Din and he’s already proving why he wasn’t worth staying for. “Sorry for the inconvenience.”

“What?” It might be funny how quickly Din flips from angry to confused, except Paz is too busy hurting to care. “Wait, no, I didn’t mean...”

He reaches out but Paz turns away, shifting on the rack to face the wall even as it puts pressure on his injured shoulder and sends fresh pain searing through his nerves. He doesn’t care. It hurts a lot less than bearing the brunt of Din’s disappointment once again.

“Paz.” Din’s voice trembles, small, but Paz squeezes his eyes shut and clamps firmly down on any budding sympathy. It doesn’t matter. Din’s just pretending anyway. “Paz, please don’t, just let me check your shoulder...”

Fingers brush his arm and he jerks away. “Leave me alone, Djarin.”

“Paz—”

“It’s what you’re best at, anyway.”

A soft, shuddering inhale. Paz grits his teeth and forces himself to remain facing the wall. He won’t apologize, not this time. Not when it’s true.

Silence settles for a few moments, broken only by the pounding of Paz’s own heart. His shoulder throbs, and for one second he desperately wishes Din hadn’t saved him. Maybe then he’d finally find some peace, instead of wondering every day what he did wrong that made his husband leave him. Maybe then he’d finally feel like he’s actually enough, that somewhere out there in this vast, uncaring galaxy, someone, just one single fucking person, has room in their heart for him.

At last, Din sighs. “Paz?” he asks, soft. “The...The new scarring on your back. What does it mean?”

It might seem out of the blue, except Paz has always been good at reading Din: the anxiety in his voice, the reluctance and resignation. The younger Mandalorian already suspects the truth, and Paz is too tired of running, of anger, of—fuck—of  _ everything _ to keep fighting anymore.

The tiny little ridges between his shoulderblades curve halfway down his back, rounded into a vaguely oval shape. The medic had recommended bacta for it but he’d refused, and the wounds had bled sluggishly for days. He hadn’t minded. It was fitting, given the circumstances.

He takes a deep breath. “It’s a shield,” he says, “to ensure I never again get stabbed in the back by someone I trust.”

The sound Din makes then, broken and small, will forever be branded on Paz’s heart. His breath shortens, a tightness in his chest like a fist squeezing, but he grits his teeth and ignores it. He’ll always love Din; it’s a truth he came to a long time ago, solid and unwavering as a black hole centering a vast swirling galaxy. But there’s a second truth as well: that, no matter how he feels about Din, he can never go back. Like two binary stars they shine bright and beautiful in each other’s orbit, but they can never collide. If they do, they’ll destroy everything.

And Paz has had enough.

“H-Husband.” Din’s voice shakes, wet, thick. “Paz, I’m so sorry, I never should’ve left—”

“No, you shouldn’t have.” He does turn around then, and for an instant the broken-open expression on Din’s face is almost enough to stop him, to make him hesitate and not break the fragile remains of the space between them. But that’s not his responsibility, not anymore. Din doesn’t get to be protected, not after what went down between them. 

“But you did,” he says, forcing himself to hold Din’s gaze steady, even as the shine in the younger man’s eyes makes everything inside him shift and cry out that  _ this is wrong, you can take it back, please don’t do this. _ “And I’ll never forgive you for that,” he hisses, even as Din flinches back as if struck. “I did right by you every step of the way, and you still left. That’s on you, Din. You’re the one who broke us.”

Din swallows and looks away. “I-I know,” he whispers, but Paz isn’t done.

Leaning forward, he taps a finger against the bondstone at Din’s throat. It’s cold and unyielding, and for one instant he imagines it shattering beneath his touch, strewn into a thousand pieces just the way Din left his heart, all those years ago. “And take this off,” he growls, as Din sucks in a breath. “You don’t get to wear it, to walk around pretending there’s anything between us, not after what you did. So take it off. You don’t deserve it.”

Din stares at him, eyes wide. He touches the bondstone, throat working as he searches for words, and isn’t it ironic how their roles have now reversed, how Din is the one now struggling to speak, and Paz is the one who’s done with them.

Maybe, for once, Din can feel what it’s like to be the one who gets left.

“Paz.” Din clutches the bondstone as if seeking a lifeline, eyes big and soft like a scared little child, and the next words are apology and plea and resignation all in one. “The...The  _ meshur’rok _ I gave you. What did you do with it?”

Paz grunts and turns back to face the wall, hissing at the fresh pain from his shoulder. “What do you think,” he says, flat. “I chucked it.”

He’s glad he can’t see the expression on Din’s face then; as it stands, the soft, broken “ _ Oh _ ” that sounds out behind him is so utterly devastated, so shot through with hurt and sorrow and soul-shattering  _ pain _ it makes tears spring to Paz’s eyes even as the noise of something shifting sounds out, followed by rapidly-retreating footsteps. He lets Din go. What can he do, anyway, to fix this thing between them that has been broken from the start, that shone so bright and hopeful at first but then never stood a chance against the grinding, ruthless machine of the universe?

He curls up under the blanket and squeezes his eyes shut, swallowing against the lump in his throat, wet and thick and pulsing with hurt. It’s better this way. It has to be.

Some things in this world just aren’t meant to be.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, you all had a lot of feels about the last chapter! It's so cool reading all your different perspectives on Din's motivations. In the end, I don't think either he or Paz are right or wrong in their choices; they're human, they both make mistakes, and I tried to communicate that here.

This time when he wakes, it’s slower: a gradual ascent out of cottony murk, to the low thrum of the ship and the echoing, far-away calls of Ghessini’s wildlife in the distance. Paz groans and slowly props himself up to sitting, blinking at the darkening sky outside. Shit, he’s slept the whole day away.

Movement in his peripheral vision and he turns to peer down the ramp. Their little campfire dances merrily away next to the ship, and Din sits next to it, poking at the flames with a stick, looking exhausted. Paz can’t help the rush of relief: he’d half-expected to wake up in the middle of the forest with Din and the Crest gone. Issik knows Din has every right, after what just happened. And it certainly would fit the pattern.

As it stands, the younger man seems to sense him looking because he pauses in his movements and turns. Their gazes lock, and Paz can’t help but swallow. Din’s face is utterly blank, smooth and expressionless as a pane of glass as he turns back to the fire without a word. Paz sighs. So that’s what it’s going to be like from now on. At least he’s gotten used to the silence.

He’s got no idea what day it is and neither does he care. If Din’s not yet finished with those replenisher capsules he will be by tomorrow, and then they can leave. He’ll ask to be dropped off somewhere, doesn’t matter where, and they’ll never see each other again. Maybe that’s for the best.

There are still a couple of broth portions left and he’s thirsty as fuck. As the metal cup fills with bubbling, dark green liquid Paz takes a moment to inspect his shoulder. It’s not hurting as much now, just a completely manageable dull ache, and the bandages look clean enough to last him the journey back to his current digs. With any luck, that client might even still be willing to make his payout. Was that only a few days ago? Feels like a lifetime.

His clothes and armor are in a pile next to the fresher. Paz shrugs on his tunic, slow, and has just fastened his cuirass and started on the pauldrons when bootsteps approach up the ramp.

He turns, wary, as Din approaches. The younger man looks like he hasn’t slept, the bags under his eyes even deeper than before, and his hair is unkempt and he hasn’t shaved, uneven stubble lining his jaw. Still, he’s standing on his own and wearing full armor, all that gleaming beskar that Paz can’t help but feel a wash of pride seeing. Din earned that, all on his own. No matter how wrecked their personal lives may be, they are both still Mandalorian.

Then Din nods at the pauldron in Paz’s hand. “Do you want some help with that?”

“No, I’m good.” To prove his point he hooks the pauldron over his shoulder, clamping down on the urge to wince as it jars his injury before picking up his vambraces. “I once managed to armor myself up with a broken leg and a head injury, remember?”

Din doesn’t smile. Paz turns away and takes a sip of broth, barely managing not to grimace at the taste. He made it, so now he has to eat it. That’s just how things are.

“Paz.” When he turns back, Din’s expression hasn’t changed. Very slowly, the younger man reaches up to undo the thin black cord around his neck. Paz suddenly finds it very hard to breathe, staring as the dark blue stone slides over cloth, Din taking a moment for a shallow, trembling breath as he holds the  _ meshur’rok _ out. “Here.”

And fuck, Paz didn’t...I mean, that’s what he wants, isn’t it, for Din to stop wearing it, but he wasn’t prepared for this and fuck, it  _ hurts. _ It’s not supposed to, not after all this time, but it fucking does and he  _ hates _ it. “Din—”

“You’re right,” Din says, and Paz can see it now, how his fist trembles where it holds the cord, stone swinging between them, winking with obscene cheer in the dim light. “I don’t deserve to wear this.”

Paz’s throat tightens, sharp denials trying to claw their way out:  _ But I gave it to you, yes, you do, I take it back, it doesn’t matter anyway. _ He swallows them all back and reaches out to take the stone. It weighs nothing, just a little trinket. As insignificant as their relationship.

“Okay,” he murmurs, thick, and isn’t sure who he’s trying to convince as he starts to turn away. Fuck, he can’t do this, he has to get out of here before—

“Not yet.”

He blinks. “What?”

Din watches him still, chin tipped up in...defiance? “I don’t deserve to wear this now,” the younger man says, “And I own that. But Paz, if you’ll let me...I intend to earn it back.”

And for the second time in as many days, Paz’s whole world turns upside down.

If Din cares that he’s gaping at him like a recently landed fish, he doesn’t comment, instead barreling on into the silence. “I fucked up,” he says, as the facade begins to crack: his shoulders slumping, eyes going soft. “I was young and stupid and afraid of my feelings, and because of that, I made you suffer. You’ll never forgive me for that and I get it, because I’ll never forgive myself. It doesn’t matter how confused or scared I was back then. I  _ hurt  _ you, Paz, and I’ll carry that for the rest of my life.”

He takes a deep breath then, shaky. “But there’s something you need to know,” he says. “It doesn’t change anything and it sure as shit doesn’t fix us, but if I don’t tell you...just. Paz, I know I got scared and I left and you have every right to be pissed at me forever for that, but you also need to know that  _ I came back. _ ”

And Paz stares. What...does that even mean? Surely Din isn’t saying...

In front of him the younger man crosses his arms and huffs a laugh, utterly humorless. “Only took me a week to realize I missed you like a limb,” he whispers. “Couldn’t think, couldn’t operate, couldn’t fucking  _ breathe _ without you there, and I saw what a giant fucking mistake I’d made, that I loved you  _ so goddamned much _ and I never should’ve gone in the first place. But by then I was already in the Aquindrian System, and I had no ship. It took me a whole month to hitchhike my way back to Chinchett.”

Oh. Oh, no. Paz swallows against the sudden cold sinking like a stone in his gut, because he knows where this is going.

“By the time I got back, you were already gone.” Din glares down at the floor, swiping stubbornly at his eyes. “Everyone in the Covert knew what had happened, so no one would tell me where you went, not even the Armorer. He almost didn’t even let me have the Razor Crest, but I guess in the end he took pity on me or something. I left immediately, and figured I’d just follow a few leads and catch up to you eventually, go grovel and beg your forgiveness and maybe let you beat the shit out of me if you wanted, and then we would be okay.”

He sniffs, voice going thin. “But what I didn’t count on was just how fucking good you are at not being found. Paz, I looked for you for over a year. Chased every lead, every rumor, any piece of intel I could get my hands on. But it was like you’d disappeared into thin air. I couldn’t find you, no matter how hard I tried.”

His voice cracks and he coughs into his fist. “Eventually I had to stop. I didn’t want to, but I had no money, no fuel. I had to find a Covert, had to take bounties and regroup. So I did, which was when I realized I had to change my strategy.

“I figured you’d need to check in with a Covert every once in a while too, because otherwise you’d be running on empty like I was. So I started moving from Covert to Covert, making money for the tribe and asking if anyone had seen or heard of you. Sometimes I got close—I missed you on Byrunia by  _ three fucking days _ —but most of the time I’d move on after a while. I just wanted to find you, Paz, even if I knew after all this time you probably wouldn’t take me back. It became my mission, my one reason for existing. It’s what kept me breathing and going, what powered me through all those awful bounties and jobs.  _ I just needed to find you. _ ”

A deep, shuddering breath. “And then suddenly, on Nevarro, I did. It was the last thing I expected, to walk into the forge and see you there in the back, and I just. I fucking  _ froze _ . All these years I’d imagined what I’d say when I saw you again, and then all of a sudden you were there and I had no fucking clue what to do. And then you treated me like a total stranger and that hurt like I was being torn apart, and it was just...too much. I couldn’t stand it, the coldness and the silence, so I started taking bounties. For the second time in my life I ran away from you, and I just thought I needed a little more time, just some space to figure out how to talk to you again, but then I got the bounty for the kid and you got so pissed about the stupid beskar and everything just went to shit and I just...I...”

He’s crying now, openly, and Paz can’t breathe with the pain. Fuck, why are they here, how the fuck did things end up going so bad? And then Din looks up at him, eyes shining with tears and a deep, soul-sucking grief that forms a black hole in Paz’s heart, swallowing everything down into nothing as his husband whispers, harsh, “I am a coward. The biggest coward in the whole fucking galaxy. I don’t deserve you, not after what I did, and you have every right to take off and leave me forever and never have anything to do with me again. And if that’s what you decide, I won’t stop you. I just...I need you to know that  _ I fucking came back. _ ”

And with a grimace he turns away and hurries back down the ramp. Paz can only stare, unmoving, watching paralyzed as Din hurries past the fire and into the woods. He wants to follow, but can’t. It’s like his body has disconnected from his mind.

In the deafening silence, he struggles for breath. Shit.  _ Shit. _ He hadn’t thought...all these years he’d assumed Din just moved on, forgot all about him and continued bounty hunting and maybe eventually settled down with someone he actually loved, someone more deserving of his attention. To know now that the younger man has instead spent the past decade searching for him, flying desperately from one end of the galaxy to the other chasing smoke-thin leads and whispered rumors, giving up the chance for a home and a life because he  _ still loved Paz _ ...

It explains everything: why Din never delisted him as the Crest’s co-owner, why he’s listed as an emergency contact, why—fuck—why the younger man still wore the  _ meshur’rok _ around his neck. 

He swallows and looks down at the stone in his palm. It’s warm now with his body heat, edges worn smooth through years of resting at the base of Din’s throat beneath his armor. To Din, wearing the bondstone was a no-brainer: they were still married, just spending time apart. All those promises they’d made to each other...Din has spent the past ten years trying his damnedest to meet them.

And Paz? Well. Din’s right: all these years he really didn’t want to be found, and he made sure of it: erasing his tracks, setting false trails, protecting his healing heart the best way he knew how. Even back on Nevarro, after getting over the initial shock of seeing Din again, he had stayed away from the younger Mandalorian as much as possible, spoken not a word and left the room whenever Din entered. He’d been in the middle of booking a ride off the planet when Din brought back that camtono of beskar.

Din’s still in the wrong here, for leaving him, for dishonoring the bond they forged together. But at the end of the day, he’s not the only one who’s good at running away.

But do they have to keep doing this dance forever?

The scars on his back tingle, and Paz takes a deep breath. Din hurt him, and that can never be erased, as permanent and deeply-settled as the marks he carved into his body. He doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to forgive Din for that, doesn’t know if he even wants to. They can never go back to what they once were.

But what if, instead, they can be something entirely new? Not as shining and beautiful as the first time, but maybe just as strong?

The stone in his hand gleams, pure and unbreakable. Slowly, Paz sits down on the edge of the rack and sifts through the pile of armor, coming up with the little cloth bag he keeps tucked beneath his left cuisse. It’s made of soft leather, worn and thin, and when he nudges it open the overhead lights fall on a collection of little trinkets tucked inside: his mother’s favorite earrings, a dried flower his little sister once gave him, a worn beskar pin from a very old friend. 

And, in the very corner, a round stone the size of his thumb, deep fiery red like flames, like devotion.

The galaxy out there is rotten to the core, full of people who are selfish and stupid and absolutely shitty to one another every hour of every day. But it is also full of love and warmth and gentleness, and hope. And maybe, just maybe, Paz Vizsla knows what’s worth holding on to.

Slowly, carefully, he drops Din’s  _ meshur’rok _ into the bag. And settles in to wait.

#

He’s never been so scared in his life.

Din hovers just inside the treeline, staring at the Razor Crest. It’s been about an hour since he left, rushing into the forest without thought for where he was going, blinded by tears as his heart crumbled more with every step. And now he has no idea what to do.

The fire’s nearly burnt out, with no sign Paz has been around to rekindle it. Does that mean he’s still on the ship? Or maybe he’s gone. Maybe he heard Din pour his heart out and decided that yes, he doesn’t have to continue on being bonded to such a giant coward. Maybe he’s even now on his way to the nearest Covert to finally get their marriage dissolved, to make sure Din never comes near him again...

No.  _ No. _ Paz wouldn’t do something like that; despite the time and distance Din  _ knows _ his husband, knows the kindness and unerring loyalty of his heart. No matter how pissed Paz is he would never just leave Din here, not while he’s still healing. It would be like expecting a Jawa not to scavenge.

Unending devotion and solid commitment: two of the many reasons why Din loves him so. 

But is it enough?

Taking a deep breath, he steps slowly out of the forest. He has no idea what’s going to happen, whether Paz will even consider giving them another shot or if instead he’ll leave for good this time. But he does know one thing: he can’t live like this anymore. Chasing Paz from one star system to another, frantic with worry and guilt and desperation, wanting to just curl up and cry every time he lost another memory: his husband’s laugh, his voice, the feel of his touch. He needs to know where they stand: whether Paz will ever let him be a part of his life, or if Din will instead have to spend the rest of his existence loving him from afar.

And he will, if it comes down to it. He’s been doing it for the past ten years: living just off the memories he has of his husband, integrating Paz into his life as much as possible even when the older man hasn’t been around. He walks through markets and thinks about what foods and trinkets Paz would like. Takes bounties and imagines strategizing with his husband at his side. Does repairs on the Crest and bitches to Paz about the work in his head, cleans weapons and imagines beating Paz’s record. Wakes up thinking of his husband, goes to bed and dreams of dark skin and a soft smile.

Does Paz know that, every night, Din sits on the rack with his child in his arms, rocking them back and forth and telling them stories about their  _ Buirok? _

He reaches the bottom of the ramp and pauses, throat tight. Seated on the floor in front of the medstation with his heavy gun in one hand and a rag in the other, Paz blinks and looks up, and Din, just like with all the other times, finds it suddenly very hard to breathe. It’s been so long since he’s seen Paz’s face; even without the dreads he’s still unerringly beautiful, a strong jaw and a broad nose and eyes so soft in the fading light, and Paz doesn’t know this but Din has been trying to memorize every detail since he took his helm off the other day, committing to memory every curve and line and slightest wrinkle, terrified that one day it’ll all be lost to him again.

And it may just be, after today.

Paz doesn’t say anything. He’s got all his armor back on, everything except the helm, and Din feels a fresh frisson of guilt lance through him when he sees the empty spot on his husband’s left arm. Gods, all these years and Paz is still sacrificing for him. When will it be enough? When will Din finally stop hurting the people he loves most?

Admittedly, he never expected Paz to show up for him in the vault. When he came out of the haze of hunger and weakness to the sight of dark blue he thought he’d died, either that or was dreaming because there was no way his husband could be here, not after all these long, lonely years. But Paz turned out to be real. He was real back then and he’s real now, watching Din quietly as he slowly makes his way up the ramp, face completely neutral, no clue to what he might be thinking underneath.

And Din doesn’t know if he has the right to ask.

In the end it’s Paz who breaks the silence first, clearing his throat. “Uh. Hi.”

“Hi.” As he’s been doing for the past hour, Din touches his neck—then swallows at the emptiness there. He doesn’t see the  _ meshur’rok _ anywhere. What did Paz do with it? “I, um. I’m done with the replenishers.”

It’s absolutely the stupidest thing to say, and very much the last thing he wants to talk about. Gods, they used to speak the same language, to know each other so well but it’s like Din’s learning a whole new dictionary now, forged through a decade of time and lightyears and bitter resentment. 

Paz just shrugs and turns back to his gun. “Good. Then we can get the hell out of here.”

And what’s left of Din’s heart crumbles into nothing.

He’s not going to cry again, damnit. Paz doesn’t need his tears, hasn’t done anything to deserve being saddled with more of Din’s shit. He’s made it clear now: he wants to leave Ghessini, to leave  _ Din.  _ They don’t go back. They’re done.

But fuck, why does it hurt  _ so fucking much? _

He doesn’t know how he manages to nod and move toward the ladderwell, but somehow he does. “Y-Yeah. Okay. I...I can drop you off at Mos Eisley, you can grab whatever transport you need from there—”

“Din.” 

A strong hand seizes his wrist. He turns to see Paz watching him, intense, and is that...no, it can’t be, he’s imagining things because that softness in his husband’s eyes, the focus and attention that sets his heart beating wildly in his chest...

Paz gets to his feet. His gun falls to the floor with an irreverent  _ clunk _ and it’ll probably scratch but Din can’t bring himself to care, suddenly having trouble breathing as his husband steps forward to face him, fingers so warm over his skin.

Paz sighs then. It’s shaky, vulnerable, and for the first time Din notices the tightness of his shoulders, the little frown line between his eyes. Paz is  _ scared _ , probably just as much if not more so than Din is, but that...doesn’t that mean...

“I’m not gonna forget the last ten years,” the older man says then, soft. “Don’t think I want to, to be honest. It sucked, Din, a real fucking lot, and I just...I don’t know if I can trust you, not right now.”

He frowns then, just a little downturn of his mouth. “But neither do I think I need to trust you, to try again.”

And Din’s heart leaps into his throat. The sound he makes is utterly embarrassing, somewhere between a gasp and a sob, and Paz must catch on to it because he moves his hand to grip Din’s fingers, running a soothing thumb over his palm as he continues, “So here’s the deal. If we do this and things go sideways again...” He shakes his head. “I’m gone, Din. Do you hear me? I’ll leave the Creed and I’ll disappear, and it doesn’t matter how hard you look or how many distress signals you send out into the galaxy. I’m not coming back, not ever. My...My heart just can’t take another hit. Do you understand?”

Din swallows and nods, heart swelling until he feels it might just burst out of his chest. “ _ Yes, _ ” he whispers, and has never meant anything more in his life. Paz doesn’t have to give him this chance, but he is and Lothir have mercy but Din is going to grab onto it with both hands and never let go. He never thought he’d be here again, granted one more chance at the greatest happiness he’s ever known, but here he is and here he’ll stay. Paz will never have to worry about them breaking again.

Because if it turns out Din really can’t do this, if he really is such an evil person as to break the same heart twice...Paz isn’t the one who will have to disappear.

In front of him, Paz breathes out. It washes warm over Din, or maybe that’s just the sight of his husband’s smile, long-missed and achingly beautiful under the harsh lights of the ship as he says, soft, “Crikana. That’s where I’m staying. It’s a shitty little place with zero ventilation and like no running water, but. But if you and the little one want to make it your home sometimes, you can find me there.”

And gods, Din can’t...he  _ knows  _ how much this costs. How despite what he just said Paz  _ is _ trusting him, giving him a direct line past all his defenses. Even after all these years, after Din took his heart and stomped all over it and left him to pick up the pieces on his own, Paz is reaching out again and Din wants—no. He  _ needs  _ him to understand. 

“Husband,” he whispers, and has the satisfaction of seeing Paz’s smile soften as he reaches out to cup his face, heart skipping when the older man pushes into the touch. “No. Where...Wherever  _ you _ are. That’s home.”

Paz huffs a laugh then, bright and magnificent. “You fuckin’ sap,” he says, and pulls Din into a kiss.

The world doesn’t explode, but it’s a close thing. Din whines and hauls Paz close, slotting his mouth against his husband’s, head spinning at the feel of it both familiar and not, Paz’s woodsy scent and heady taste and full-on  _ presence  _ surrounding him in warmth and protection and unerring, solid love. Gods, he’s never letting go, not now, not ever. The universe has given him this second chance, and Din Djarin will gladly die before he wastes it.

Paz hums into his mouth, pressing forward and Din lets him, feels the edge of the rack hit the backs of his knees and goes obediently down, pulling his husband on top of him, losing himself in the older man’s scent and the feel of his body, strength and connection and  _ Paz, Paz, Paz. _ And in that moment, as his husband presses him back onto the hard metal grate and kisses him, fervent and passionate, Din closes his eyes, feels the sting of tears, and makes his greatest promise.

Never again. Never again will he allow them to be separated, to open up another rift of hurt and resentment. He’s got Paz in his life again, no idea why but he does, and he’ll be damned if he lets his husband slip away a second time. The rest of the galaxy can decide it doesn’t want them to be, can throw all its machinations and workings into gear to tear them apart, but it won’t matter. Din Djarin has his husband back, and he’s never letting him go again.

The universe can try its best to steal their happiness.

But it had better be ready for one hell of a fight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short epilogue next week!


	6. Chapter 6

TWENTY YEARS LATER

Arayc has never met a legend before.

She knows that’s frivolous: no decent Mandalorian would ever stoop so low as to proclaim himself a legend. But she can’t help it: if anyone deserves the title it’s Din Djarin. The man got their Darksaber back, for Issik’s sake, after tearing his way through basically an entire army of Imps and those goddamned _Jetii_. “Legend” is an understatement.

And today, she finally gets to meet him.

Bamei, her friend who first got her into this Covert, just laughs at her whenever she brings it up.  _ Groupie, _ they tease, with a friendly slap to her shoulder.  _ What’re you hoping to do, get in his pants? _

And Arayc doesn’t, thank you very much. She just swore the Creed last year, she’s much too young to even bother thinking of something like that, and besides, Djarin’s far too old for her. It’s just...he’s the reason they’re here, as a culture and a group. He’s the reason why their Coverts no longer have to be hidden, why the galaxy once more regards Mandalorians with awe and respect, why they’ve managed to return so much of their precious beskar lost in the war so long ago.

She just wants to meet him, and thank him for everything. If it weren’t for Din Djarin, none of them would be here.

Bamei doesn’t believe her, of course.  _ If you want to sleep with a celebrity, why not go for Vizsla? _ they said, then cackled until Arayc tackled them to the ground. Truthfully, though, she’d been rather starstruck to find him here too: Paz Vizsla, one of the last of the old clans. There’s not much left of them these days but everyone knows the stories, and when Arayc first met him she’d barely been able to speak, too busy staring at the distinctive blue armor and the  _ jai’galaar _ on his shoulder. Vizsla had taken pity on her, filling in the gaps as she stumbled over her words, and since then Arayc likes to imagine they’re something like friends, greeting each other warmly in the Covert’s winding halls and occasionally getting together for a round of  _ cu’bikad. _

She likes him, Vizsla. He’s not stuck up like some of the other descendants of the old Houses she’s met over the years, and he doesn’t waste time waxing poetic about the “good old days,” even though she senses he’s seen more than enough action to fill several volumes. He’s in fact surprisingly down-to-earth, and she suspects it’s got at least a little to do with two things: the fiery red bondstone he wears at his throat, and the three children and five grandchildren he’s got running around the Covert.

She doesn’t know who Vizsla is married to (and she doesn’t intend to find out, no matter how much Bamei teases her about issuing a challenge), but she suspects they’re the lucky one in the relationship. 

A sharp poke in her side, and she jumps and turns to Bamei. “Did you hear what I said?” her friend asks, and Arayc blushes beneath her helm.

“Sorry. What?”

Bamei sighs, but Arayc senses no true annoyance in their tone as they repeat, “You may not be able to talk to Djarin directly, when he gets back. Not immediately, anyway.”

Arayc frowns. “Why not?” Word is Djarin rarely takes bounties these days, preferring to leave the chasing and fighting to the younger  _ beroya. _ If anything, he should be looking for some connection after spending so much time alone in deep space.

“Well.” Bamei shrugs. “The thing is—”

“Here he comes!” someone cries, far too enthusiastically in Arayc’s opinion. There’s a soft snort behind them: Vizsla is here too, leaning back against the far wall. Why he bothered showing up Arayc has no idea. He’s been in this Covert forever; shouldn’t he be used to Djarin by now?

Her thoughts are interrupted, though, by movement from one of the side tunnels. Firm bootsteps sound out as beskar gleams under the lights, and the entire room shifts as Din Djarin steps into the forge.

Arayc’s first thought is that, for someone who apparently fights like a demon and once faced down an entire Imperial Remnant with nothing but a blaster and a couple of friends, Djarin looks surprisingly...normal. His armor is a little scuffed, long burgundy cape torn along the bottom, and he smells faintly of blaster smoke and engine oil as he crosses the space to kneel before their Armorer. “ _ Ijaa’lor. _ ”

“Din Djarin.” There’s a clear smile in the Armorer’s voice. Arayc doesn’t blame her; apparently she and Djarin go way back, all the way to Nevarro. They’ve been around a long time. “I take it the job went well?”

“As well as could be expected.” Djarin’s voice is raspy and low, even through the modulator. “I decided not to accept monetary compensation, and instead obtained some intel on a possible group of Purge survivors located in the Outer Rim.”

Some soft murmurs throughout the room; it’s been a long time since they’ve discovered a new Covert, one that still believes they must hide who they are. The Armorer raises a palm, and they fall silent.

“This is valuable information,” she says. “Thank you for continuing your work to rebuild our culture. I will have Nikai and his scout team check in with you tomorrow.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Anything else to report?”

“No, ma’am.”

The Armorer’s voice goes warm, so much so that Arayc feels a settling in her own chest. “Then go forth and rest. You’ve earned it.”

“Thank you,  _ Ijaa’lor. _ ” Djarin bows his head, then straightens up, scanning the room. He must be looking for the fastest way back to his living unit, and Arayc can tell when he finds it because he instantly strides forward. 

Quickly she moves to intercept him. “Djarin’ _ kii _ , it is an honor to—”

He sweeps right past her, so close he nearly bumps her shoulder. As she staggers back she notices two things: one, Djarin wears a  _ meshur’rok _ , deep blue and glittering like a scattering of stars.

And two, he’s not aiming for an exit.

From his place at the back of the room, Vizsla detaches himself from the wall just in time for the other man to rush into his arms. He bowls back a little with the momentum, soft laugh audible even in the midst of the crowded room. “Oof. Hi.”

And Arayc stares, everything falling into place.

“Hi,” Djarin murmurs, looking like he wants to just disappear into Vizsla, gently bumping his helm against the older Mandalorian’s. “I missed you.”

Vizsla chuckles at that. “It’s only been a week.”

“I don’t care.” There’s a fierceness in Djarin’s voice, something hot and burning and yet somehow fragile at the same time. “Paz...”

Vizsla sighs, and it’s probably only because she’s standing so close that Arayc hears the slight tremble there. “Yeah.”

As the two older Mandalorians head toward the nearest exit, pressed close and murmuring softly, Bamei comes up to stand beside Arayc. “So.”

Arayc shakes her head. “You didn’t tell me they were together!”

“I know. Must’ve slipped my mind. They’ve been in this Covert so long I guess it’s just...part of the landscape. Like that ugly-ass auxiliary hangar Nikai always says he’s gonna fix.”

Arayc hums, watching as Djarin and Vizsla vanish around a corner. “They’re kinda...clingy.”

“Yeah.” Bamei shrugs. “Djarin especially. It’s like, I dunno, like he’s really afraid of losing Vizsla or something. No idea why, given they’ve been married forever. Maybe something happened early on, before all this.”

“Maybe.” Arayc sighs. “So. No talking to him directly, huh?”

Bamei nods. “You noticed how  _ Ijaa’lor _ said Nikai wouldn’t check in with Djarin until tomorrow? We all know how this works. He and Vizsla generally need a few hours together every time one of them gets back from a job.”

“What for? If they wanted to debrief they could just—oh.  _ Oh. _ ”

She can’t help the blush, and Bamei just laughs. “You were bound to find out sooner or later,” her friend says, before tilting their helm in the direction of the rec room. “In the meantime, how ‘bout a game of  _ cu’bikad _ before chow?”

And as Arayc nods and tails Bamei from the room, she can’t help but grin. Yeah, she’ll have to wait a bit longer before she gets to talk to Djarin, but that’s neither here nor there. Din Djarin and Paz Vizsla have earned their peace. She would never dream of interfering with that.

They persist, as always, against the greatest of odds.

This is the Way.

And she’s never been more proud to follow it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it, folks! Thanks for sticking with me the whole way through. Stay safe out there!

**Author's Note:**

>  **Permissions:** All my works, including this one, can be translated and podficced without first asking my express permission. I ask only that you credit me as the original author and provide a link back to the original work. For anything else, please ask first. Thanks.


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